Here’s my review of 2018. It was a dicey year for me, with some bright spots. I’ll start with the Attack. Those of you who follow me on Facebook and Twitter—and I posted a blog on WordPress, but took it down for legal reasons—know that in July, 2018 I was violently attacked on a sunny summer afternoon while I was walking around beautiful Lake Merritt in Oakland, California.
A man literally sprang out of the flowering bushes and confronted me on the sidewalk. He tried to beat me up, drawing his fist back to punch me in the face. I fended him off, then he shoved me down a pedestrian walkway into two lanes of oncoming traffic. I shuffled my feet to avoid plunging into the traffic and fell on my right hip on the concrete street curb. The Oakland police apprehended and arrested him. I took an ambulance ride to the hospital, was x-rayed and informed that I had a fractured right hip and broken right femur. Early in the morning the next day, I underwent three hours’ of surgery under general anesthetic.
It’s been a long, brutal six months since then, but as of January 1, 2019, I am walking without a walker or a cane. I’m not as mobile as I used to be. I’m working on that, doing physical therapy every day. I’ve gone grocery shopping with my husband three times, going into the market without a cane (but leaning on a shopping cart). I still have pain, especially in my knee, but I’m walKING! Thrilled about that. And I’m about a third of the way through a nonfiction book inspired by the ordeal and some issues that cropped up as a result. I hope to be done with the piece in 2020. It’s called Sticks and Stones Will Break My Bones.

Now for the good news:
“Aurelia” was published in the January-February 2018 issue of the Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction. Here’s one review: https://alexclarkmcg.wordpress.com/page/4/Jan 23rd, 2018, Aurelia by Lisa Mason, Fantasy and Science Fiction Magazine, Jan/Feb 2018
“Another fantastic piece in what is shaping up to be a fantastic issue of F&SF. While the last piece I read out of this issue, The Equationist by J.D. Moyer, was my favorite story out of the issue at the time, it will have to share the podium with this gem as well–though I like them for very different reasons.
Aurelia is the story of a debaucherous lawyer who is presented with the woman of his dreams. She lives in a manner overlooking the San Francisco Bay, and but a nefarious person is trying to buy her property. She hires the protagonist, Robert, to be her lawyer, but quickly seduces him–though as he is looking for a wife to make himself look more respectable than he already is–the seduction is mutual. They are married within a month, and their sex is like nothing Robert has experienced.
However, Robert still hungers for sexual relations with nearly every woman he comes into contact with. He cheats on his wife with his psychologist, with the intern, with the lowly tax attorney when he is away on a work trip.
And that isn’t all that’s wrong either. Aurelia, Robert’s wife, has an art studio above the garage. He has only been inside once, and only with her permission. It holds a sense of decay and has burlap twine crisscrossing it so that you have to duck and weave around it. Everything about this studio is wrong, in comparison to everything about the manor next door. It is decadent and majestic, while the studio is decaying and dark.
That’s a pretty good set up. Obviously, Aurelia isn’t what she seems, and there are lots of hints along the way for readers to figure out what will happen before it does.
It is a gothic tale, but also rather fairy tale-esk in the telling. A thoroughly enjoyable experience from a writer I’ll certainly look for in the future.” (A)

Finally, “The Bicycle Whisperer” was published in the May-June 2018 issue of The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction. Here’s one review http://sfbookreview.blogspot.com/2018/05/mayjune-2018-fantasy-and-science-fiction.html “Simon’s bicycle runs away. He hires the Lone Rangerette to find her, which she does. LR finds Shimano Stella, calms her down and asks her whether she has run away to get away or to get attention. A lot of story packed into five pages.”

Forthcoming in 2019 is a story “Taiga” in the April 2019 digest of Not One of Us, edited by John Benson. And the REALLY BIG NEWS is that my new high-concept SF novel, CHROME, will be available for pre-order on May 21, 2019 and go on sale on September 24, 2019!

So there you have it, my friends. More stories and novels are on the way!

If you would like to receive Lisa Mason’s quarterly newsletter, New Book News, please respond by email to lisasmason@aol.com, enter “Add Me” on the subject line, and it shall be done. You may unsubscribe at any time.

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I did 150 steps on the stepper and took a long walk, indoors, without the cane. The leg is getting better and stronger. My goal is to become stronger than I was before the Attack. Meanwhile, I’m so thrilled this book is back in print! And as timely as ever!

What readers say:
“This book was so true to life that I felt like I was there. I recommend it to anyone.”
“More than a great science-fiction, a great novel as well.”
“My favourite SF book of all time, beautiful, cynical and completely involving….Unmissable!”

Brand-new 2018 review of SUMMER OF LOVE at http://sfbookreview.blogspot.com/2018/02/summer-of-love-by-lisa-mason.html
”Ever since the Save Betty project completed there has been degradation in the archives. The Luxon Institute for Superluminal Applications (LISA, still love that acronym) has determined that San Francisco in 1967 is a hot dim spot. They commission the Summer of Love project. Twenty-one year old Chiron Cat’s Eye in Draco will t-port from 2467 to the summer of love where he is to find the Axis, a teenage girl from the Midwest will have important descendants, and protect her through the summer. This Susan Stein takes an alias, so Chiron has only probabilities to know if he finds the right girl.
In 1967 Susan receives a postcard from Nance, aka Penny Lane, who is in San Francisco. Her parents find the postcard, tear it up and burn it. She runs away that night and takes the name Starbright. She arrives hoping to see Penny Lane, but instead meets up with Stan the Man, manager of the Double Boogie band. She is invited to live with them in a house that is a constant party. She loves it, but a week later Stan hooks up with someone new. She meets Ruby again and Ruby takes her in. That first night Chiron saw an eye symbol by Ruby’s shop, decided to hang around there and Ruby let him sleep on the couch. He’s not sure that Starbright is the Axis, but there is a high probability.
Without being preachy major themes in the book include the environment, population control, women’s rights and addiction. These were put into the setting of real life 1967. Street names referenced in the book exist and the Grateful Dead did have a concert there on August 22. I enjoyed the story without any nostalgic feeling, other than references to old Star Trek episodes and other SF works.I really enjoyed the book. It was a little icky when Starbright was staying at the Double Boogie house, but after that it was excellent and that first chapter or two set up encounters throughout the rest of the book. I loved all three of the main characters, Starbright, Chiron and Ruby.” By John Loyd

The year is 1967 and something new is sweeping across America: good vibes, bad vibes, psychedelic music, psychedelic drugs, anti-war protests, racial tension, free love, bikers, dropouts, flower children. An age of innocence, a time of danger. The Summer of Love.

San Francisco is the Summer of Love, where runaway flower children flock to join the hip elite and squares cruise the streets to view the human zoo.

Lost in these strange and wondrous days, teenager Susan Bell, alias Starbright, has run away from the straight suburbs of Cleveland to find her troubled best friend. Her path will cross with Chiron Cat’s Eye in Draco, a strange and beautiful young man who has journeyed farther than she could ever imagine.

With the help of Ruby A. Maverick, a wise and feisty half-black, half-white hip entrepreneur, Susan and Chi discover a love that spans five centuries. But can they save the world from demons threatening to destroy all space and time?

A harrowing coming of age. A friendship ending in tragedy. A terrifying far future. A love spanning five centuries. And a gritty portrait of a unique time in American history.

The cover, hand-drawn by Tom Robinson, is styled to look like a 1960s psychedelic poster.

What the professional book reviewers say:

“Captures the moment perfectly and offers a tantalizing glimpse of its wonderful and terrible consequences.” San Francisco Chronicle

“Mason has an astonishing gift. Her chief characters almost walk off the page. And the story is as significant as anyone could wish. This book will surely be on the prize ballots.” Analog

“A priority purchase.” Library Journal

5 stars From the Readers

Calling All FansAmazon Verified Purchase‘Summer of Love is an important American literary contribution that may very well have a strong and viable fan base. Where are you? Join us!
This novel is loads of fun to read. The majority of the characters are hippies from the 1960s who meet a stranger from the future who’s looking to save his world. This fellow, Chiron, needs to find a troubled adolescent teen named Susan (a.k.a. Starbright) for a very compelling reason. The book has a great deal to offer: swift action, lovable characters, spiritual insight, and well-chosen primary documents such as essays, poems, and news articles which round out the reader’s understanding of the worldview of the novel.
I think Summer of Love has excellent potential for a wider audience. I hope it continues to enjoy a healthy amount of sales in the used books market on this site. I wish even more for it to be in wider circulation. Some books talk about the sixties. This novel IS the sixties, thanks to the spirit and scholarship of its author. And, as one reader aptly put it, ‘the sci-fi stuff is just plain off the hook.’ Get a copy. Most people who have read it seem to respect it and enjoy it every bit as much as I do.”

New Reader Review! “Just checked to see if this book was on Kindle. It has been many years since I’ve read it but I remember it as one ofmy very favorite books. Time to go back and re-read it!”

In 2010, the ebook revolution took the publishing business by storm, and I was able to get Summer of Love before new and long-time readers alike as an ebook.

If you would like to receive Lisa Mason’s quarterly newsletter, New Book News, please respond by email to lisasmason@aol.com, enter “Add Me” on the subject line, and it shall be done. You may unsubscribe at any time.

If you enjoy a title, please “Like” it, add five stars, WRITE A REVIEW on the site where you bought it, Tweet it, blog it, post it, and share the word with your family and friends.

The seven books by New York Times Notable Book AuthorLisa Mason are now offered as newly reissued beautiful trade paperbacks and distributed by Barnes and Noble, as well as on Amazon! All are also ebooks available on retailers worldwide, along with Mason’s other titles that are ebooks only.
Shop the Internet from the comfort of your home or office or the convenience of wherever you are with your mobile device!
Please click on the title to view the book cover, a book description, and more reviews.

As you can see below, I’ve got lots of stories and novellas, a screenplay and a miniseries, Celestial Girl (A Lily Modjeska Mystery), online as ebooks. Check it out! Celestial Girl will be a trade paperback as soon as we figure out the logistics. And a second story collection, Oddities, is forthcoming.

If you would like to receive Lisa Mason’s quarterly newsletter, New Book News, please respond by email to lisasmason@aol.com, enter “Add Me” on the subject line, and it shall be done. You may unsubscribe at any time.

If you enjoy a title, please “Like” it, add five stars, WRITE A REVIEW on the site where you bought it, Tweet it, blog it, post it, and share the word with your family and friends.

If you would like to receive Lisa Mason’s quarterly newsletter, New Book News, please respond by email to lisasmason@aol.com, enter “Add Me” on the subject line, and it shall be done. You may unsubscribe at any time.

If you enjoy a title, please “Like” it, add five stars, WRITE A REVIEW on the site where you bought it, Tweet it, blog it, post it, and share the word with your family and friends.

Below are the eligibility requirements for the CreateSpace Direct program:
1. You or your business must be a licensed business and provide an active reseller certification.
2. Titles must be enrolled in the CreateSpace Direct channel within Expanded Distribution (ED) to be eligible for wholesale prices. Each member is responsible for enrolling their own titles in this channel.
[Note: all Lisa Mason titles are (or will be) enrolled in Expanded Distribution.]

Retail orders for books not enrolled in the CreateSpace Direct channel will be subject to sales tax.

If you would like to receive Lisa Mason’s quarterly newsletter, New Book News, please respond by email to lisasmason@aol.com, enter “Add Me” on the subject line, and it shall be done. You may unsubscribe at any time.

If you enjoy a title, please “Like” it, add five stars, WRITE A REVIEW on the site where you bought it, Tweet it, blog it, post it, and share the word with your family and friends.

We’re so excited! The seven books by New York Times Notable Book Author Lisa Mason we are offering as newly reissued beautiful trade paperbacks are now distributed by Barnes and Noble, as well as on Amazon! All are also ebooks available on retailers worldwide, along with Mason’s other titles that are ebooks only.Shop the Internet from the comfort of your home or office or the convenience of wherever you are with your mobile device!
Please click on the title to view the book cover, a book description, and more reviews.

As you can see below, I’ve got lots of stories and novellas, a screenplay and a miniseries, Celestial Girl (A Lily Modjeska Mystery), online as ebooks. Check it out! Celestial Girl will be a trade paperback as soon as we figure out the logistics.

If you would like to receive Lisa Mason’s quarterly newsletter, New Book News, please respond by email to lisasmason@aol.com, enter “Add Me” on the subject line, and it shall be done. You may unsubscribe at any time.

If you enjoy a title, please “Like” it, add five stars, WRITE A REVIEW on the site where you bought it, Tweet it, blog it, post it, and share the word with your family and friends.

We are offering seven books by New York Times Notable Book Author Lisa Mason newly reissued as beautiful trade paperbacks for the year-round book-buying season. All are also ebooks available on retailers worldwide.
Shop the Internet from the comfort of your home or office or the convenience of wherever you are with your mobile device!
Please click on the title to view the book cover, a book description, and more reviews.

If you would like to receive Lisa Mason’s quarterly newsletter, New Book News, please respond by email to lisasmason@aol.com, enter “Add Me” on the subject line, and it shall be done. You may unsubscribe at any time.